Yes, I'm aware of the arguments made by YEC's for a young earth. What I'm asking is how do you reconcile that with the overwhelming amount of physical evidence that shows a universe and an Earth that is much older?

Jason, they are mostly based upon circular reasoning and have strong evidence against all of them.

Any time you can't repeat a result it should be canned until it does instead of making up "Ad Hoc" excuses. Try repeating a chemistry experiment 41 times and only getting a expected result only once. You will be thrown out of the lab by claiming the method works.

Carbon dating is accurate because it's correlated by tree ring data.

Took a 290 ring Douglas-fir log of known age by historical methods and cross-matched it to 113 places in the Pacific Northwest Douglas-fir master growth ring sequence with greater than 99.9% accuracy (according to T-"wiggle match" values). Yamaguchi DK 1986-Interpretation of cross section correlation between tree-ring series. Tree-Ring Bulletin 46,47-54

Six of these matches were non-overlapping, which means that this particular piece of wood could be dated to be any one of these six vastly different ages to within a 99.9% degree of confidence.

In almost all branches of science,other than tree-ring studies,there is a check on the validity of published research. Other researchers can,and often will,independently seek to replicate the research... Tree-ring studies do not have this check... The result is a system in which investigators can claim any plausible results and yet are accountable to no one." Douglas Keenan-Why Radiocarbon Dates Downwind From the Mediterranean Are Too Early, Radiocarbon Vol.44,NR1,2002,P.225-237

Then both methods are correlated to a volcanic eruption of known age. The problem here is: scientists still debate which eruption it actually was.

This illusion of correlation is a careful selection of interpretation.

If the decay rate is 7 days, then the initial amount is still important because we don't know how long it's been producing it. And the decay rate has no observable means of telling us when it occurred except the assumption that the speed of light has been constant. Something that size produces a lot of gravity and gravitational time dilation would slow down it's apparent time in relation to earth's time. Now that the mass is being expelled, the gravity is reduced and the decay time is now in equilibrium with our time. It's still just an assumption that the speed of C is constant without any consideration to the rest of general relativity.

Not that I'm against a constant speed of C. I'm simply forced to ask "Constant in relation to what?" The fastest speed of C is measured in a vacuum. Now what is it's speed in the absence of gravity? If photons have mass (as recent research indicates), then gravity certainly affects it's speed.

Haldane's Dilemma is a severe limit on the speed of evolution, first calculated in 1957 by renowned evolutionary geneticist, J. B. S. Haldane. The limit is sufficiently slow that it calls into question the Ã¢â‚¬Å“factÃ¢â‚¬Â of evolution, or evolutionary genetics as an empirical science. The problem also displays various forms of long-term negligence from evolutionary leaders.

The Dilemma

Evolution requires the substitution of new beneficial mutation into the population, to create new biological adaptation. Haldane calculated that organisms with low reproduction rates, such as cows, could substitute a new beneficial mutation no more frequently than one per 300 generations.

The problem can only be seen through examples, and the easiest example to understand is human evolution. Start at some alleged human ancestor ten million years ago, which generously allows evolution far more time than is available. (Allegedly the last common ancestor between humans and chimps was three to five million years ago. And the human adaptations in question are alleged to have evolved mostly within the last two million years.) In ten million years, an ape-human-like lineage could substitute no more than 1667 beneficial mutations. In evolutionary genetic literature, it is undisputed that HaldaneÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s calculations, if correct, would indicate such a limit. (And according to evolutionary geneticists, each of those substitutions is typically one nucleotide, not thousands of nucleotide differences.)

All the necessary data, theory, and claims, come from evolutionists. The calculation is:Allow 10 million years for an ape-man lineage. (This figure favors evolution by allowing far more time than is available.) Divided by 20 years effective generation time. (This figure is from evolutionary geneticists, for this lineage, over this period of time.) Divided by 300 generations per beneficial substitution. (This figure is from HaldaneÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s calculations.) Equals a maximum of 1667 beneficial mutations substituted into that ape-man lineage. (Plus some limited number of neutral mutations, which do nothing to improve adaptation.)

The problem is: Can all the uniquely human adaptations be explained within that limit? Such adaptations would include: the tripling of brain size, upright posture, hand dexterity, vocal speech organs, language, distribution of hair, and appreciation of music, to name a few. That can be compared with the power of beneficial mutations observed today, such as the alleged examples in the beaks of Galapagos finches. Is a limit of 1,667 beneficial mutations sufficient to create all the uniquely human adaptations? This is HaldaneÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s Dilemma. The problem is deepened by the fact that HaldaneÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s assumptions are wildly unrealistic in favor of evolution. (See the assumptions.)

A similar problem exists for other species, especially those with low reproduction rates and long generation times, such as: whales, elephants, bears, apes, and so forth. The higher the generation time and the lower the reproduction rate, the fewer beneficial mutations are substituted over time.

Status

HaldaneÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s Dilemma is easy to communicate Ã¢â‚¬â€œ a limit of 1,667 beneficial mutations for human evolution. Yet evolutionists never communicated any such limit to the general public. Even their technical journals strongly avoided such direct figures, and instead spoke obliquely in terms of substitution rate Ã¢â‚¬â€œ such as Ã¢â‚¬Å“one gene substitution per 300 generations,Ã¢â‚¬Â a phrase that obscures the problem from view, and may as well be in code.

Moreover, the evolutionary literature on HaldaneÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s Dilemma is extremely confused, contradictory, and unresolved Ã¢â‚¬â€œ though evolutionists do not generally acknowledge those particulars. The confusion still permeates evolutionary literature today, and makes discussion awkward. For example, evolutionists will cite one evolutionary geneticistÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s paper as true, when many other evolutionary geneticists implicitly regard it as false Ã¢â‚¬â€œ and the matter remains unresolved because evolutionary leaders have not explicitly addressed such contradictions. If you enter into this controversy, be prepared for such mischief. Calls for evolutionists to clear up this topic have been ignored. (For example, see a tale of peer-review, where evolutionary leaders suppressed clarifications from their journals.) Evolutionary leaders have a lengthy record of negligence on this important problem Ã¢â‚¬â€œ a record of mis-communication, a record of allowing falsehood and confusion to prevail for decades. No conspiracy is suggested, but there is long-term negligence. That negligence itself is worth studying, that we may better understand the sociology of science.

In addition, evolutionary literature has scarcely begun to discuss, much less establish, that 1,667 beneficial mutations (or any other figure) is sufficient to explain human evolution.

Despite those failures, most evolutionary geneticists regard the problem as Ã¢â‚¬Å“solved,Ã¢â‚¬Â and largely set it aside in the 1970s. However, there exists no agreed solution to HaldaneÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s Dilemma. Evolutionary geneticists contradict each other not only about the solutions, but also about the basic fundamentals of the problem itself.

Evolutionary geneticist, G. C. Williams, writes:

Ã¢â‚¬Å“In my opinion the [Haldane's Dilemma] problem was never solved, by Wallace or anyone else. It merely faded away, because people got interested in other things. They must have assumed that the true resolution lay somewhere in the welter of suggestions made by one or more of the distinguished population geneticists who had participated in the discussion.Ã¢â‚¬Â (G. C. Williams, 1992, Natural Selection: Domains, Levels, and Challenges, p 143-144, emphasis added)

To many creationists, Haldane's Dilemma falsifies large-scale evolution. To other creationists, HaldaneÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s Dilemma demonstrates that evolutionary genetics cannot cope with its central issues Ã¢â‚¬â€œ evolutionary genetics is theoretical castles-in-the-sky, substantially disconnected from empirical reality; amorphous and ultimately untestable; not an empirical science. As HaldaneÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s Dilemma moves forward, Walter ReMine predicts evolutionists will increasingly advance unfalsifiable (untestable) aspects of evolutionary theory and evolutionary genetics. This suggests the evolutionistsÃ¢â‚¬â„¢ explanation is either falsified, or unfalsifiable Ã¢â‚¬â€œ and either way it is not scientific (using the same definition of science that evolutionists endorsed in court).

According to current models of stellar evolution, when a star like our sun is very young, its enormous output of energy is provided by gravitational contraction. As it grows older, the models show that the source of its energy should change over to that of nuclear fusion as it slowly develops a very hot and dense core. Where exactly does our sun fit into this sequence?

The standard model of the sun assumes that it is around 5 billion years old and that it has already passed into its nuclear burning stage. This makes it all the more extraordinary that in 1976 a team of Russian astronomers, writing in the respected British scientific journal Nature showed how their research pointed clearly to the startling fact that the sun does not even seem to possess a large dense nuclear burning core. Instead, their results showed the sun as bearing the characteristics of a very young homogeneous star that corresponds with the early stages of the computer models.

The astronomers also proposed that nuclear reactions "are not responsible for energy generation in the sun."They said that such a conclusion, "although rather extravagant," follows from their own research into the analysis of the global oscillations of the sun and is quite consistent with two other major observational findings. They cited these other evidences as being the observed absence of appreciable neutrino flux from the sun, and the observed abundance of lithium and beryllium in the stellar atmosphere.

So not only did the team of astronomers propose the startling idea that nuclear reactions are not responsible for the source of the sun's energy, but they also put forward the equally startling concept that the sun, according to their data, could be homogeneous throughout.Both of these revolutionary ideas would fit in perfectly with the concept that the sun is a very young star.

All three of these major discoveries that point towards a young sun have since been confirmed by independent observations. This article will evaluate and update these findings and point the way to recent discoveries that show that the sun cannot possibly be the old nuclear burning, main-sequence star that it was once assumed to be.

THE FIRST EVIDENCE FOR A YOUNG SUNThe fundamental oscillation of the Sun matches the model for a young star.

In the same way that seismology gives us information about the structure of the Earth, so the relatively new discipline of helioseismology also provides important information on the structure of the sun. If the sun is an old star, then, according to the "standard model," it should have a large core reaching out to a distance of around 175,000 km from its center and having a density about fourteen times that of lead.A core of such a size and mass would, of course, have a substantial effect on any global oscillations of the Sun. In particular, the presence of such a large core would mean that the sun's global oscillations would range up to a maximum fundamental radial mode of oscillation of around one hour.Oscillations greater than one hour would involve such enormous amounts of energy that they would result in the complete disruption of any large core that might be present in the sun.

If, however, the sun is similar to a very young homogeneous star that has not yet developed a large central core, then its spectrum of global oscillations have been calculated as including a much longer fundamental radial oscillation of 2 hours 47 minutes, together with a non-radial fundamental oscillation of 59 minutes and either a second harmonic radial oscillation of 47 minutes or a 42 minute, non-radial second harmonic oscillation.

The predicted oscillation of 2 hours 47 minutes is particularly important as being a key distinguishing feature of a young homogeneous star.

The Russian astronomers were certainly startled to find that their observations of the sun were showing large and remarkably stable global oscillations with a period of 2 hours 40 minutesÃ¢â‚¬â€very close to that predicted for a young homogeneous sun.

When trying to explain this quite unexpected observation, they stated in their article that a "most striking fact is that the observed period of 2 hours 40 minutes is almost precisely the same . . . as if the sun were to be an homogeneous sphere."

The concept of the sun's being an homogeneous sphere was so contrary to all previous ideas that the Russians were anxious to find alternative explanations. They kept on returning, however, to the conclusion that their work, which involved the observation of systematic fluctuations in very large portions of the sun's surface (comparable in size to the radius of the sun's disc) "points definitely to pulsations of the sun as a whole."

Confirmations of their observations

A British group soon confirmed the 2 hour 40 minutes oscillation. They also discovered further oscillations that included a 58 minute oscillation and a 40 minute oscillation.These three values are almost precisely those predicted for a homogeneous star of the same size and mass of the sun. When they published their results they stated that "Current solar models predict a period of about 1 hour corresponding to a steep density increase in the solar interior, in marked contrast to the observed 2.65-hour period, which is consistent with a nearly homogeneous model of the sun."

Comments from other astronomers

The unexpected observations have gone solidly against the predictions of the standard model of the sun. The solar astronomer Lain Nicholson, said of the long period oscillation that if it was a true fundamental period, then the "standard model could not be correct," and that the "central temperature of the sun would be less than half the conventional value."Such a low temperature would, of course, again fit in with the sun being a young star that has not yet achieved a sufficiently high temperature for main-sequence hydrogen burning.

The British astronomers J. Christenson-Dalsgaard and D.O. Gough commented that in order to account for the 2 hour 40 minute observation it is "evident that a very drastic change in the solar model would be necessary" and "it is unlikely that any such model can be found."

This striking discovery of the sun's oscillations is not, however, the only evidence of a young sun.

THE SECOND EVIDENCE FOR A YOUNG SUNThe Solar Neutrino Emission is that of a young star.

The Russian team stated that the low neutrino flux, of the sun also fits in with their proposal that the energy of the sun did not come from nuclear sources.

The low neutrino flux is a well known and long standing problem for modern astronomy. A group of solar physicists, writing in the National Research Council publication Decade of Discovery, stated that the neutrino emission from the sun is "a problem that has worried astronomers for years" and that "the discrepancy is serious."

A low neutrino flux which results in a correspondingly low, temperature of the sun's core, again fits in perfectly with the sun being a young star that has not yet achieved full nuclear burning of hydrogen, but is obtaining its energy from a slow gravitational contraction.

THE THIRD EVIDENCE FOR A YOUNG SUNThe Lithium and Beryllium abundance in the sun is consistent with that of a young star.

The article in Nature stated that "the abundance of lithium and beryllium in the solar atmosphere is another confirmatory evidence that nuclear energy is not responsible for the majority of the energy generation in the sun."

We know that lithium would be destroyed in around 7,500 years when the central temperature of a young star reaches 3 million degrees.

Observations show that the sun has already lost all but around one thousandth of its original abundance of lithium.This implies that if the sun had the expected initial abundance of lithium, then its central temperature must, of course, be at least 3 million degrees.

However, the sun still has its normal abundance of beryllium, which is destroyed at a temperature of 4 million degrees.If the Russian scientists are correct in assuming that the sun is homogeneous, then this means that the temperature throughout the whole sun must be far lower than the 15 million degrees required for the sun to be an old, main-sequence star.

RECENT SUPPORTING EVIDENCES

There are a great many confirmatory evidences for a young sun. One of the most recent was the announcement at a major scientific conference in 1995 that the temperature at the center of the sun seems to be varying over a period of several months.This is extremely hard to understand if the sun has a huge central core with a resulting enormous heat capacity. However, such rapid temperature changes are explicable if the sun is young and homogeneous. In such a situation there can be very rapid convective changes in temperature throughout the entire sun. (This idea will be developed in a future article.)

CONCLUSION

The three major observational evidences described in this article correlate with the expected characteristics of a young star that is obtaining its energy from gravitational contraction. The sun simply does not seem to have a large core that is very dense and has the high temperature that can sustain hydrogen nuclear burning. In other words, the sun definitely does not show the characteristics of a multi-billion-year-old star, but instead shows the characteristics of an exceedingly young star.

Haldane's Dilemma is a severe limit on the speed of evolution, first calculated in 1957 by renowned evolutionary geneticist, J. B. S. Haldane. The limit is sufficiently slow that it calls into question the Ã¢â‚¬Å“factÃ¢â‚¬Â of evolution, or evolutionary genetics as an empirical science. The problem also displays various forms of long-term negligence from evolutionary leaders.

Laying aside the fact that Haldane's Dilemma is a theoretical one, is there any evidence that more than 1,667 beneficial substitutions are required between humans and chimps?

Laying aside the fact that Haldane's Dilemma is a theoretical one, is there any evidence that more than 1,667 beneficial substitutions are required between humans and chimps?

Hi JMcp,

ScienceDaily (Mar. 6, 2007) Ã¢â‚¬â€ Although the human and chimpanzee genomes are distinguished by 35 million differences in individual DNA "letters," only about 50,000 of those differences alter the sequences of proteins. Of those 50,000 differences, an estimated 5,000 may have adaptive consequences in the evolutionary divergence between these two species, according to a study published in the March 6, 2007, issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Before such a new and beneficial mutation can take its place in the human genome it has to pass through a rigorous two-step--negative and positive--screening process, say the study authors, evolutionary geneticists from the University of Chicago, the University of Tokyo and the University of Washington. Both steps focus on the most radical changes.

In step one, mutations, the genetic equivalent of typographical errors, are randomly introduced. When these mutations are still rare in the population, only strongly deleterious ones get weeded out through negative selection. The more radical mutations are more likely to be harmful and quickly removed. For those that are only slightly harmful, neutral or beneficial, the selective forces are weak and luck determines their fates.

Using these results, the researchers measured how many of the amino acid changes within functioning genes were adaptive--able to survive rigorous negative selection and then spread rapidly throughout a population. They estimated "the proportion of adaptive changes between human and chimpanzee to be 10.4 to 12.8 percent," similar to previous estimates using entirely different approaches.

When they multiplied that result times current estimates of the number of functional genes, it came to about 3,000 to 7,000.

"These are the genetic changes that are possibly adaptive," said Wu. "Out of those differences, we suspect that some, and perhaps most, are responsible for the most significant changes between human and chimpanzee."

Evidence continues to mount contradicting the evolutionist's claim that man and ape share a common ancestry. Over the last 20 years, studies have shown that the human mutation rate is inexplicably too high. A recent study published in Nature has solidified this. These rates are simply too high for man to have evolved from anything, and if true would show that man must in fact be regressing (a position very consistent with a recent creation of man). Most evolutionists ignore this problem, and those who do attempt to address it leave us with just-so stories void of any supporting evidence.

Exposing the cards

Let's first consider the recent Eyre-Walker & Keightley article in Nature magazine. By comparing human and chimp differences in protein-coding DNA, they arrived at a deleterious (harmful) mutation rate for humans of U=1.6 per individual per generation. They acknowledge that this seems too high, but quickly invoke something called "synergistic epistasis" as a just-so explanation (I'll address this later).

What is not adequately conveyed to the reader is just how bad this problem is for evolution. It is related to the renowned geneticist J.B.S. Haldane's reproductive cost problem that Walter Remine so eloquently elucidated in "The Biotic Message". What we will determine is how many offspring are needed to produce one that does not receive a new harmful mutation during the reproduction process. This is important since evolution requires "beneficial" mutations to build up such that new features and organs can arise (I say "beneficial" loosely, since there are no known examples where a mutation added information to the genome, though there are some that under certain circumstances can provide a temporary or superficial advantage to a species). If over time harmful mutations outpace "beneficial" ones to fixation, evolution from molecules-to-man surely cannot occur. This would be like expecting to get rich despite consistently spending more money than you make.

So, to determine the reproductive impact, let

p = probability an individual's genome does not receive a new defect this generation

A female is required to produce two offspring, one to replace herself and her mate. So, she needs to produce at least 2/p to pay this cost and maintain the population. Let B represent the birth threshold:

B = 2/p

The probability p of an offspring escaping error-free is given by e^-U. Therefore, making the substitution,

B = 2e^U. For U=1.6, B = 9.9 births per female!

What pray tell does this mean? What are the authors failing to make crystal clear? It says that females need to produce over 10 offspring just to keep genetic deterioration near equilibrium! A rate less than 10 means certain genetic deterioration over time, because even the evolutionist's magic wand of natural selection cannot help (in fact Eyre-Walker & Keightley had already factored in natural selection when they arrived at a rate of 1.6)

Now consider that extremely favorable assumptions for evolution were used in the Eyre-Walker & Keightley article. If more realistic assumptions are used the problem gets much worse. First, they estimate that insertions/deletions and some functional non-genic sequences would each independently add 10% to the rate. Second, and more importantly, they assume a functional genome size of only 2.25% (60K genes). When they assume a more widely accepted 3% functional genome (80K genes), they cite U = 3.1, which they admit is "remarkably high" (even this may be a favorable assumption, considering Maynard Smith estimates the genic area to be between 9 - 27%).

Widely recognized geneticist James Crow in an article in the same Nature issue agrees that the deleterious rate is more likely twice the rate cited by Eyre-Walker and Keightley. So if we use Crow's revised rate of U=3, we get:

B = 2e^3 = 40 births before we get one offspring that escapes a new defect!

The evolutionist's just-so explanation

So are we to believe that upward evolution can overcome what is obviously an insurmountable reproductive barrier? Let's check the evolutionist's explanation and see if it holds water. Crow acknowledges that given these mutation rates and a conventional elimination of mutations, a species with limited reproductive capacity will face "inevitable extinction."He then adds: "a way out is for mutations to be eliminated in bunches". This is sometimes called truncation selection, a completely speculative process that you will have a very difficult time finding in any college text book on genetics or biology. One possible reason you won't find this in the text books is because there is absolutely no evidence to support that it occurs in nature.

This brings us back to Eyre-Walker & Keightley's invocation of "synergistic epistasis", which is really a co-star in the "truncation selection" story (the terms are virtually synonymous). This process basically says that each new harmful mutation interacts with prior harmful mutations such that fitness is decreased more than it would have if the new mutation were acting by itself. This allows organisms to push below a fitness threshold where they can more readily be recognized by selection and eliminated from the population. Thus, harmful mutations are eliminated "in bunches". Here again we have pure speculation with no real, tangible evidence to support it.

For the sake of argument, even if synergistic epistasis/truncation selection occurs to sufficiently mitigate the deterioration problem, you still need beneficial mutation fixation to outpace harmful mutation fixation in the eventual survivors. This is unfathomable considering that 40 conceptions are needed just to get an offspring without one of these incremental deteriorating steps. You simply cannot evolve new organs and features when negative hits are outpacing positive ones with such force.

Crow concludes by stating that the high mutation rate helps explain the advantage of s@x to evolution. Sure, s@x will certainly slow the propagation of harmful mutations (a conservation property completely consistent with a creationist viewpoint). But Crow is forgetting the other side of the coin, that s@x will also slow the propagation of beneficial mutations! Recombination has long been considered a paradox among evolutionists, since it greatly hinders the spread of those crucial "beneficial" mutations needed to make a man out of a monkey. Right out of the gate the mutation must overcome the 50% recombination barrier. s@x is especially a problem in small populations due to the affect of genetic drift (punctuationists claim that the spawning ground of large-scale evolution occurs in small populations). Regardless, s@x certainly doesn't solve, let alone address the reproductive cost problem discussed above.

High rate supports recent creation of man

If the deleterious mutation rate is indeed as high as 3 per individual, not only would it thwart the evolutionary scenario of chimp/man common ancestry, it would clearly argue for a recent creation of man. To illustrate this, let's start with a simple model where we will assume heterozygosity throughout the generations (this essentially means no inbreeding), using the rate of 3 harmful mutations per individual. Each generation, offspring will inherit on average 3 harmful mutations from the parents (half of 3 from the mother, half of 3 from the father), plus 3 new mutations during the reproduction process. The number of mutations in each offspring after x generations is U * x, where U is the mutation rate. Using the standard population genetics assumption of 25 years per generation, there are 240 generations in 6000 years. So, 3 * 240 = 720 mutations per individual after 6000 years. This isn't too severe considering the size of the active genome, where we have an estimated 80,000 genes, averaging about 1500 base pairs per gene. So 720 mutations spread over the genome amounts to about one mutation per 111 genes. However, if we use the evolutionist's estimated time since the split between ape and man of 6 million years, we get 720,000 bad mutations, or about 9 mutations per gene! We would more resemble a snail than a human! (it should probably come as no surprise that some evolutionists actually posit that apes de-evolved from humans!)

Note that more than 50% of these mutations will be recessive, and therefore not expressed. However, as we introduce inbreeding and homozygous fixation of genes into this model, the numbers will obviously get worse. Fixed dominant genes won't have to contend with a good copy on the other chromosome, and recessive genes will have a chance to express themselves (one in four if both parents have the defect). If we take all this into consideration, the evolutionary timescale numbers get exponentially worse compared to a trivial decline in the recent creation numbers.

Mitochondrial-DNA rates offer some collaboration. Consider this article from the journal Science:

"Mitochondrial DNA appears to mutate much faster than expected, prompting new DNA forensics procedures and raising troubling questions about the dating of evolutionary events. ...Regardless of the cause, evolutionists are most concerned about the effect of a faster mutation rate. For example, researchers have calculated that "mitochondrial Eve"--the woman whose mtDNA was ancestral to that in all living people--lived 100,000 to 200,000 years ago in Africa. Using the new clock, she would be a mere 6000 years old."

The evolutionary squeeze

The evolutionists are in a squeeze, and it's devastating. We have seen from the analysis above that it is implausible for evolution to occur at such a high deleterious mutation rate. But what if you lower the rate? Well, then all kinds of new problems pop up for the evolutionist! A slower rate means a smaller portion dedicated for those rare "beneficial" mutations, so there will be fewer substitutions of new traits over time. Consider that population geneticists typically estimate that only 1 in 50 beneficial mutations have a chance to even reach fixation. This problem is aggravated by the fact that a cost must be incurred to spread any new trait through the population (those without the trait must eventually die off). The famous geneticist J.B.S. Haldane showed that under favorable assumptions only one new, beneficial substitution could be completely substituted in a population every 300 generations. So in 10 million years, twice the time since the alleged chimp/human split from a common ancestor, only 1667 beneficial substitutions could occur. That's only a 0.001% difference between human and chimp genomes. The entire number of substitution differences between man & chimp, ranging from harmful to neutral to beneficial, is estimated to be between 1-3%, or 30-90 million substitutions. Surely 1667 is not enough to make a man out of a hairy, armpit-scratchin, dung throwin' ancestor! Evolutionists need to add about another 1000 trillion years to their cake mix just to get an ape with manners!

Some evolutionists try to "fix" this problem by lowering the amount of functional genome. But as this is lowered, they remove space for new genes that are absolutely essential for their theory. Evolutionists who are aware of the information problem try to solve it by claiming that beneficial random mutations to duplicated genes, under the guidance of natural selection, is what gets upward evolution rolling. But a smaller functional genome obviously means less chance for a duplicated gene to be mutated (all this assuming increased information by random mutation can even occur, which information theory says it can't). Some evolutionists dispute this small of a functional genome. As mentioned earlier, Maynard Smith estimates it to be between 9-27%. If further evidence expands the functional genome toward 10%, then the mutation rate/reproductive cost problem gets much worse, requiring evolutionists to "fruitfully multiply", and now, if they want a self-fulfilling theory!

Conclusion

The high mutation rate from the Eyre-Walker & Keightley study was determined under the assumption of common ancestry between chimps and man. Since the rate is clearly too high, there are only two realistic explanations:

1) there is a mistake in their data or analysis (doubtful), or2) the base assumption that man and chimp share a common ancestor is flawed (most likely).

The problem of high mutation rates and its cost on reproduction goes away if comparison between simian and man DNA is not used to determine the mutation rate. Remove the flawed assumption that simian and man share a common ancestor, and the problem is solved!

The concepts of "synergistic epistasis" and "truncation selection" would never be brought up if it were not for the high mutation rate problem. These stories were invented to attempt to lessen a clearly serious problem for the modern evolutionary theory. Moreover, even if such forces were at work in nature, they would at best only serve to keep the genetic load in check (that is, slow or bring deterioration to a standstill). What's lost in all this wild speculation by the evolutionists regarding a high deleterious mutation rate is the fate of beneficial mutations, the mechanism that is supposed to bring about new organs and improved functions over time. In the long run you must have more beneficial mutations accumulating than harmful ones for molecules-to-man evolution to be true. The above analysis shows just how implausible this is. You can't save pennies and spend dollars and expect to get rich.

Finally, a double-edged sword shows that while high rates of mutation cause harmful mutations to overwhelm any beneficial ones, lower rates slow evolution to a crawl. But regardless of the rate of mutation, what we've learned from information theory is that information can only originate from an information Giver. Random mutations occur, and without new information being fed into an organism by an information Giver, these random changes will certainly cause the organism to slowly deteriorate over time. Other studies showing high mutation rates that do not rely on man/chimp ancestry confirm that deterioration may indeed be occurring.

Escaping natural gas. Oil and gas are usually located in a porous and permeable rock like sandstone or limestone. Fluids and gas can easily travel through the containing rock, but more slowly pass out through the impermeable rock cap. The rate of gas escape has been found far too rapid to agree with long ages. If the theory were true, all the natural gas would now be escaped.Oil seepage. If much oil seepage had occurred from out of the ocean floors, all the oil in offshore wells would be gone if the earth were 20,000 years old.

Lack of anciently destroyed reservoirs. All the oil in the world must have been placed there in relatively recent times. If long ages had elapsed, the oil reservoirs would be gone, and we would only find the cavities where they had been. But such locations are never found.

I think you need to quote sources for your evidence. As a Geologist with more than 10 years experiance working in the Oil Exploration Industry I can tell youthat your statements are just plain wrong. All the science behind petroleum geology points to an old earth and new oil fields are successfully predicted and discovered on this basis.

If the Biblical Flood occurred about 5000 years ago and destroyed all dry-land plants, then the oldest any living plant could be is about 5000 years old.

Bristle-cone pines have been dated at about 5000 years old!

Maybe these trees began to grow shortly after the flood of the days of Noah!

Scientists are carefully watching Niagara Falls.

"Because the rim of the falls is wearing back at a known rate every year, geolo-gists recognize that it has only taken about 5000 years to erode from its origin- al precipice." [Dennis Peterson, Unlocking the Mysteries of Creation, vol. 1 (El Cajon: Master Books, 1988) p.39]

OUR RECEDING MOON

Adding to the evidence for a young earth is our receding moon.

Scientists calculate that our moon is moving away from earth at a rate of about two inches per year.

If the earth is 4.5 billion years old then the moon should have drifted out of sight.

The age of the bristlecone pines do not indicate a young earth. There are living objects that older than that such as the King Clone creosote bush in the Mojave Desert.

Niagara Falls was created during the last ice age, its age does not indicate the age of the earth.

Your calculations of the receding moon is incorrect, it is 3.8 cm. Since the moon is 3.85 Ãƒâ€” 1010 cm from the earth, this is already consistent, within an order of magnitude, with an earth-moon system billions of years old.

More recent direct mtDNA mutation rate studies also seem to confirm the earlier findings by Parsons and others. In an 2001 article published in the American Journal of Human Genetics, Evelyne Heyer et. al., presented their findings of the mtDNA mutation rate in deep-rooted French-Canadian pedigrees.

Their findings "Confirm[ed] earlier findings of much greater mutation rates in families than those based on phylogenetic comparisons. . . For the HVI sequences, we obtained 220 generations or 6,600 years, and for the HVII sequences 275 generations or 8,250 years. Although each of these values is associated with a large variance, they both point to ~7,000-8,000 years and, therefore, to the early Neolithic as the time of expansion [mostly northern European in origin] . . . Our overall CR mutation-rate estimate of 11.6 per site per million generations . . . is higher, but not significantly different, than the value of 6.3 reported in recent the recent pedigree study of comparable size . . . In another study (Soodyall et al. 1997), no mutations were detected in 108 transmissions. On the other hand, two substitutions were observed in 81 transmissions by Howell et al. (1996), and nine substitutions were observed in 327 transmissions by Parsons et al. (1997). Combining all these data (1,729 transmissions) results in the mutation rate of 15.5 (Cl 10.3-22.1). Taking into account only those from deep-rooting pedigrees (1,321 transmissions) (Soodyall et al. 1997; Sigurdardottir et al. 2000; the present study) leads to the value of 7.9. The latter, by avoiding experimental problems with heteroplasmy, may provide a more realistic approximation of the overall mutation rate."

Also, consider an even more recent paper published in a 2003 issue of the Annals of Human Genetics by B. Bonne-Tamir et al. where the authors presented their results of a their study of "Maternal and Paternal Lineages" from a small isolated Samaritan community. In this paper they concluded:

"Compared with the results obtained by others on mtDNA mutation rates, our upper limit estimate of the mutation rate of 1/61 mutations per generation is in close agreement with those previously published." [compared with the rate determined by Parsons of 1/33 generations, a rate of 1/61 is no more than double].

One more interesting paper published in September 2000 in the Journal Scientist by Denver et al. is also quite interesting. These scientists reported their work with the mtDNA mutation rates of nematode worms and found that these worm's molecular clocks actually run about "100 times faster than previously thought" [emphasis added].

"Extrapolating the results directly to humans is not possible, say the scientists. But their results do support recent controversial studies suggesting that the human molecular clock also runs 100 times faster than is usually thought. This may mean that estimates of divergence between chimpanzees and humans, and the emergence of modern man, happened much more recently than currently believed, says the team. 'Our work appears to support human analyses, which have suggested a very high rate,' says Kelley Thomas of the University of Missouri. 'This work is relevant to humans,' says Doug Turnbill of the institute for Human Genetics and Newcastle University, UK. 'If the human mutation rate is faster than thought, it would have a lot of impact in looking at human disease and forensics, as well as the evolutionary rate of humans.' . . .

Mutation rates of mtDNA in humans are usually estimated by comparing sequences of DNA from people and other animals. 'This is kind of analysis that was used to determine that the African origin of modern humans was about 200,000 years ago,' says Thomas. 'The problem with this approach is that you are looking at both the mutation rate and the effects of natural selection,' he says. The technique would also miss multiple mutations in the same stretch of mtDNA, says Paul Sharp of the Institute of Genetics at Nottingham University, UK.

More recent studies have looked at the mtDNA of people who are distantly related but share a female ancestor. This approach has revealed higher mtDNA mutation rates. But the results have not been accepted by many scientists [emphasis added].

Knowing the exact rate of mutation in humans is very important for forensic science and studies of genetic disease, stresses Turnbill. Forensic identification often rests on comparing samples of DNA with samples from suspected relatives. Faster human molecular clocks could complicate established exact relationships, he says."

Nuclear DNA mutation rates

As with mitochondrial DNA mutation rates, the mutation rates of nuclear DNA have often been calculated based on evolutionary scenarios rather than on direct methods. By such methods, the average mutation rate for eukaryotes in general is estimated to be about 2.2 x 10-9 mutations per base pair per year. With a 20 year average generation time for humans, this works out to be around 4.4 x 10-8 mutations per base pair per generation. Since most estimates of the size of the diploid human genome run around 6.3 billion base pairs, this mutation rate would give the average child around 277 mutational differences from his or her parents. This sounds like quite a high number and it is in fact on the high end of the spectrum when compared to studies looking more specifically at human mutation rates verses eukaryotic mutation rates in general. A particular study by Nachman and Crowell estimated the average mutation rate specifically in humans by comparing control sequences in humans and chimpanzees. Using these sequence comparisons, "The average mutation rate was estimated to be ~2.5 x 10-8 mutations per nucleotide site or 175 mutations per diploid genome per generation" [Based on a higher diploid genome estimate of 7 billion base pairs].

These non-direct mutation rate estimates might actually seem reasonable given that they seem to match the error rates of DNA replication that occur between the formation of a zygote in one generation and the formation of a zygote in the next generation. From fertilization to the formation of a woman's first functional gamete, it takes about 23 mitotic divisions. Men, on the other hand, contribute about twice as many germ line mutations as women do. At least part of the reason is that their stem cells keep dividing so that the older a man gets before having children more mitotic divisions occur.

Now, consider that each diploid fertilized zygote contains around 6 billion base pairs of DNA (~3 billion from each gamete/parent, using a conservative round number).32 From cell division to cell division, the error rate for DNA polymerase combined with other repair enzymes is about 1 mistake in 1 billion base pairs copied. At this rate, there are about 6 mistakes with each diploid cell replication event. With a male/female average of 29 mitotic divisions before the production of the next generation, this works out to be about 175 mutations per generation.

Of course, this is right in line with the mutation rates that are based on evolutionary scenarios. However, some estimates place the overall mutation rate as low as 1 mistake in 10 billion base pairs copied. At this rate, one would expect around 0.6 mistakes with each replication event and only around 17 mutations per person per generation. So, perhaps something else is going on that also influences the nuclear DNA mutation rate? As it turns out, replication errors are not the only sources of DNA mutations. Damage to DNA can and does often occur spontaneously. Genome stability is continually challenged by a diverse array of mutagenic forces that include errors during DNA replication, environmental factors such as UV radiation, and endogenous mutagens such as oxygen free radicals generated during oxidative metabolism. This damage must also be detected and repaired on a constant basis. Of course, this repair isn't perfect and therefore likely contributes significantly to the actual mutation rate far over that estimated by the indirect methods discussed above.

In fact, the actual observed mutation rate is likely to be quite a bit higher than 1 x 10-8 per generation - - at least 10 fold higher and by some estimates (see Link). Such high mutation rates are based on actual observed rates of functional mutations in the human genome and directly observed mutation rates in pseudogenes - such as those found in C. elegans (see further discussion below).

Again, consider that the rate of 1 x 10-9 per year that is referenced above is an indirect estimate based on evolutionary assumptions of the time since the MRCA between two species. This particular commonly-referenced rate is based on the supposed time since the MRCA between the two species and the comparison of sequences which are though to be functionally neutral.

"Comparisons of pseudogenes and of synonymous sites between humans and chimpanzees have suggested mutation rates on the order of 10-8 per site per generation [ or about 10-9 per site per year] (e.g., KONDRASHOV and CROW 1993 Down; DRAKE et al. 1998 Down)." (see Link)

So, you see, mutation rate estimates based on this sort of evolutionary assumption produce a self-fulfilling prophecy when it comes to estimating the time of the MRCA between humans and apes based on mutation rate analysis. On the other hand, more direct methods of detecting the nuclear mutation rates in animals suggest that the actual rate is likely to be about ten times higher than estimates based on indirect methods and evolutionary assumptions. Consider the following excerpt from Denver et. al. published in Nature in 2004:

"Alternative approaches in mammals, relying on phylogenetic comparisons of pseudogene loci and fourfold degenerate codon positions, suffer from uncertainties in the actual number of generations separating the compared species and the inability to exclude biases associated with natural selection. Here we provide a direct and unbiased estimate of the nuclear mutation rate and its molecular spectrum with a set of C. elegans mutation-accumulation lines that reveal a mutation rate about tenfold higher than previous indirect estimates and an excess of insertions over deletions." (see Link)

The age of the bristlecone pines do not indicate a young earth. There are living objects that older than that such as the King Clone creosote bush in the Mojave Desert.

Your assuming that the entire colony started out as a single plant (very unlikely). And your assuming that the climate in the area has always been the same (Also very unlikely). In a wetter climate, the growth rates would increase.

Niagara Falls was created during the last ice age, its age does not indicate the age of the earth.

The falls itself doesn't, but it corroborates with the YEC model. Instead of picking a limited data set; It shows that everything in geology fits the model.

Thus, to calculate the age of the Falls from estimates of erosion rates, we need to include all these relevant factors. Even allowing for the thinner limestone strata in the downstream five-mile section of the gorge makes a huge difference to the estimate. Assuming that the half-thickness limestone eroded at twice the present rate, then the five-mile section would have been excavated in about 3,000 years. In the upstream section, the thickness of the limestone increases from 14 metres (45 feet) at the suspension bridge to 27 metres (90 feet) at the Falls. Assuming an average thickness of about 21 metres (70 feet) and an average erosion rate of two metres (seven feet) per year gives an age for the upstream two miles of the gorge of about 1,400 years. Altogether, the estimate for the whole gorge is 4,400 yearsÃ¢â‚¬â€much less than the 35,000 years Lyell published, and the current Ã¢â‚¬ËœageÃ¢â‚¬â„¢ of 12,000 years. And we have not yet calculated the age effects of increased sediment load, increased water flow, or the possibility of erosion by ice, etc. Thus, the revised age agrees remarkably with the end of the Ice Age (3,800 years ago), which followed NoahÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s Flood (4,300 years ago).

Your calculations of the receding moon is incorrect, it is 3.8 cm. Since the moon is 3.85 Ãƒâ€” 1010 cm from the earth, this is already consistent, within an order of magnitude, with an earth-moon system billions of years old.

As a result, some of the Earth's rotational momentum is gradually being transferred to the Moon's orbital momentum, and this causes the Moon to slowly recede from Earth at the rate of approximately 38 millimetres per year. In keeping with the conservation of angular momentum, the Earth's rotation is gradually slowing, and the Earth's day thus lengthens by about 17 microseconds every year.

According to wikipedia, the source does appear to be wrong. But the actual rate measured does give us a maximum age much lower than an order of magnitude. The actual age would be 1.4 billion which would obviously make precambrian evolution impossible and any life impossible for many millions of years after that. I don't know what the effects would be if the moon were half the distance, but that would be a time just before the cambrian explosion.

I think you need to quote sources for your evidence. As a Geologist with more than 10 years experiance working in the Oil Exploration Industry I can tell youthat your statements are just plain wrong. All the science behind petroleum geology points to an old earth and new oil fields are successfully predicted and discovered on this basis.

Here is a peer reviewed paper with multiple lines of evidence in favor of a young age for oil.

Escaping natural gas. Oil and gas are usually located in a porous and permeable rock like sandstone or limestone. Fluids and gas can easily travel through the containing rock, but more slowly pass out through the impermeable rock cap. The rate of gas escape has been found far too rapid to agree with long ages. If the theory were true, all the natural gas would now be escaped.Oil seepage. If much oil seepage had occurred from out of the ocean floors, all the oil in offshore wells would be gone if the earth were 20,000 years old.

Lack of anciently destroyed reservoirs. All the oil in the world must have been placed there in relatively recent times. If long ages had elapsed, the oil reservoirs would be gone, and we would only find the cavities where they had been. But such locations are never found.

Not even close. Shell pays me a nice salary because old my use of date of geologists using old Earth geology makes them billions a year.

1. Petroleum becomes trapped by formations of lower permeability. If what you're saying is true there would be far more economic ways of extracting petroleum.

2. Seepage is far too slow to appreciably drain reservoirs. In fact seepage is most often seen in California, and many of the reservoirs the oil is seeping from are too small to invest in recovering the crude.

3. You don't have cavities in the Earth holding crude oil. Crude exists in spaces in formations and when you drill you get lots of undesirable Earth coming through the boar. The worst thing that happens over time is bacterial degradation which still wouldn't leave a cavity.

Could you please take your time and not post so hastily. I can barely make out the meaning of your first sentence because of poor sentence structure.

The secular world is divided on the origin of oil and is supported by more than just assumptions that it is young in age.

The purpose of this paper is to discuss the origin of oil and gas, collectively called petroleum because they are found in rock (petros). There are two models competing for attention in the secular world. The best known is that where living matter is assumed to decay and form oilÃ¢â‚¬â€hence the name Ã¢â‚¬Å“fossil fuel.Ã¢â‚¬Â The other model is that of an abiogenic originÃ¢â‚¬â€meaning that oil is directly produced from primordial matter.

Because of the interest in the topic, a recent Hedberg Conference turned its attention to the topic, and a summary paper has now been produced (Katz, Mancini, and Kitchka 2008). The conference could not resolve the dilemmaÃ¢â‚¬â€Ã¢â‚¬Å“Which of the models is correct?Ã¢â‚¬Â.Both models contain subjective assumptions, and so the answer may be neither model is correct, and that a third model is required to cope with all the known data. All three options are explored in this paper.

Fusion of human chromosome 2 is evidence of a recent human bottleneck dating to ~3,000 years ago. Close to the date given for a global flood, but an incredible 50 orders of magnitude younger than the evolutionists prediction for the MRCA.

Again, it is entirely possible, quite likely in fact, that our human ancestors underwent a chromosomal fusion event during a population bottleneck in fairly recent history (i.e., within the past several thousand years at most), easily explaining the fusion of chromosome 2. This concept is supported by an article published in a 2003 issue of Nature by Rohde et. al. where the authors make the following argument:

"These analyses suggest that the genealogies of all living humans overlap in remarkable ways in the recent past. In particular, the MRCA [most recent common ancestor] of all present-day humans lived just a few thousand years ago [~3,000] in these models. Moreover, among all individuals living more than just a few thousand years earlier than the MRCA, each present-day human has exactly the same set of genealogical ancestors." Link

The only thing that helps us find more oil now is seismic, and drill core samples. Which enable us to see or find buried oil that is'nt visible by seepage.

Wait, so if the Indians had no knowledge of either model then they couldn't have applied young Earth geology. So I ask again, can you find hundreds of millions of dollars in oil using young Earth geology. Even the creationists geologist I work with is an old Earther because you just can't sanely argue it's young.

Seismic data doesn't say there's oil. It gives you a general idea about subsurface formations and helps geoscientists figure out if there might be oil using the old Earth geology they learned in college. If it was just as simple as looking at seismic data there wouldn't be the risk of dry holes now would there.